Data communication networks, such as transport, access, and aggregation networks, are built using Ethernet. Current Carrier Ethernet techniques use Connectivity Fault Management (CFM) as specified in ITU-T Recommendation Y.1731 “OAM functions and mechanisms for Ethernet based networks” and in IEEE 802.1ag “Connectivity Fault Management,” both of which are incorporated in-full by reference herein. CFM provides Operations, Administration, and Management (OAM) mechanisms to detect Ethernet connection impairments between two end points. Currently, these mechanisms require that endpoint nodes send heartbeat Continuity Check (CC) frames at regular intervals to each other on an Ethernet path. A sustained interruption (e.g., preconfigured number of instances) by virtue of non-receipt of contiguous heartbeat frames at a receiver is considered a fault in the path from a transmitter to the receiver.
Disadvantageously, existing Ethernet OAM mechanisms require the endpoint nodes to send contiguous heartbeat frames, i.e. Continuity Check Message (CCM) frames, for each Ethernet path at regular intervals. In addition, to detect a fault within a 50 ms timeframe (i.e., a typical requirement in carrier networks) in order to fail-over to a protected path, the regular interval must be very short, such as on the order of every 3 ms. These techniques have scalability problems as the number of Ethernet paths increase between two end nodes. For example, these techniques consume processing resources at a node, consume bandwidth on the line, and the like.